my poor hamstring

So I have a few things to blog about that are actually triathlon related!

Today I had my 6th trip (I think??) to the chiropractor. Kenny, the chiropractor, has been doing a variety of things to my hamstring, glute, and hip flexor including ART, ultrasound, and Graston. While I am fairly optimistic that this treatment WILL help me, it has succeeded in making my hamstring more sore than it was before all of this nonsense. Today was my first foray into Graston since.. 2001 when I had it done on my ankle because of tendonitis. And my memory was correct - it HURTS. Actually, it REALLY F-ING HURTS!

I was lying facedown on the table and he was flexing my hamstring and rubbing the stainless steel Graston tool along the grain of my muscle. You wouldn't think it would hurt but it really, really does. You can feel the tool scraping against the scar tissue. It's making me cringe just thinking about it right now! He said to me, "I can tell you're in pain when I hear the crinkling of the paper." There is a paper thing under the headrest of the table - I'm assuming for sanitation purposes, and while he was doing the Graston I was cramming my head as far into the table as I could. Seriously, I need a leather strap to bite on or something. It's just awful. My hamstring is now KILLING me. But if it helps, then I don't care! I think next weekend he is going to send me on a run to test it out, and hopefully I will be ok to do some short runs because my off-season is over in 10 days!

Tuesday morning, Mary dragged me out of bed to swim at 8 am. Yes, I know, I'm lazy, but I worked until 11:15 pm.. so I think I'm allowed to not like getting up at 7 am the next morning! We went to her super swanky gym where there is a heated, outdoor pool that is still open in mid-October! I was skeptical that it wouldn't really be that warm, but it was sooooo nice to be swimming outside, in the morning, in freaking October! I would say I swam for about 45 minutes and then she taped me using an underwater video camera thingy, which will get analyzed this weekend! I really don't even want to see it. I hadn't swam in weeks, I was tired after 10 minutes, and I don't think my swim form is great to begin with. Plus, swimsuits are not flattering. Period. Every time I saw her with the camera, I started laughing.. while swimming.. so I'm sure that the video just looks absolutely ridiculous. But then we sat in the hot tub which made up for the embarrassing swim video.

Our machine is down at work so we are really, really slow this week. Last night I had one thing to do. The most exciting part of my night was when my coworker left his cell phone on his desk and I had to take it out to him at the gate at like 8 pm because he didn't want to come inside. Tonight I have one thing to do as well. I'm hoping that tomorrow (Friday) my supervisor will let me come in on days instead of evenings because it's pointless to be sitting at work on Friday night with nothing to do. I'm hoping to work 8-4 or so (it's hard to work evenings on Thursday and then get up and go into work at 7 am on Friday.. 8 is more feasible). It's not that I have any fun activities planned for Friday night (I never plan anything on Fridays when I'm on an evening shift).. it just makes the weekend longer when I don't have to spend Friday evening at work.

So that's that! 10 days left of being a lazy blob! I am almost excited to start training again. Almost, but not quite. :)

next time, I'll wear shorts

Today (well technically Wednesday) was the day of my first ever chiropractor appointment! I slept until 3:30 pm or so and then had to get moving so I could get to my appointment at 4:45. I saw Kim in the parking lot because she had an appointment with the same guy at 3:45! She has new pink K-Swiss running sneakers and I am jealous.

After I made the appointment last week I asked Kim a crucial question. Will I need to remove my pants for this appointment? (Since my problem area is my upper hamstring). She said that she had never had to so I just wore warm-up pants.

First question I'm asked by the doctor. Are you wearing shorts under your pants? Um, no. Sorry! Guess I'm taking off my pants and wearing that cool looking gown instead. Note to self: wear less inappropriate underwear next time. Scratch that, wear shorts next time. Because I wound up lying on this table thing on my stomach, wearing a sexy blue hospital gown, heating pads on my butt and upper legs, underwear riding up, praying to god that the young, cute chiropractor does not look at my ass.

Apparently I am known for my love of no-pants situations (which is true), however these are generally in the comfort of my apartment and not in public with cute doctors.

Anyways..

This guy specializes in A.R.T. (active release technique) and Graston Techniques. The first one is a soft tissue massage technique used to get rid of scar tissue and smooth out muscle tissue (at least from what he explained to me and what I researched after the appointment because I'm a NERD). I had never had this done before but I have heard of it. The second one is massage with the use of stainless steel tools, used to stimulate blood flow and get rid of scar tissue. Unfortunately, I HAVE had this done a long time ago on my ankle when I had tendinitis, and it hurts like a bitch.

He did some massaging to find out where the tightness was occurring in my leg. He did some range of motion tests and some stretching. Crazily enough, the weird tingling that I've been getting in my toes on my right foot is DIRECTLY related to this hamstring thing.

After he did his range of motion tests and massage and whatnot, he deduced that I am having issues with my glute and my hamstring. What I think happened was that last year I pulled my hip flexor while training for the Philly Marathon. It hurt but I could still run, so I ran through it. Eventually the pain went away but I then developed a soreness in my butt when I would run (by this point it was winter and I was doing some hilly snowshoe running which REALLY bothered it). Apparently, the hamstring is there to help out the glutes - the glute is a primary extensor muscle and the hamstring is a secondary extensor muscle (the glute extensor is paired with the hip flexor meaning they work opposite of each other). I guess the change in my running gait or whatever to compensate for these sore muscles affected my hamstring and effectively was too much for it, which is why it is now really sore. This is all theory, but I told him what kind of niggling injuries I've had over the past year and that is how he explained it to me, and it makes sense to me!

Today he did some ART and this is how we discovered that the toes tingling is linked to the hamstring. He would do some massage-y thing to my hamstring and my toes would immediately start to tingle, it was nuts! I never knew if they were related, or if my sneakers were bothering my foot for some odd reason, but it's definitely the hamstring! Thank god because the tingling was starting to really freak me out! I was instructed to go home and ice my hamstring because it would be irritated and inflamed, so I did. It is now quite sore.

I'm going back for another appointment on Friday. Next week starts the Graston...

I am very optimistic about this treatment! The appointment was not at all hokey like I had imagined these things to be, where a chiropractor is trying to crack my back, etc. It seemed like a legitimate sports medicine solution to my problem. We will see. He said he should know within 4 sessions whether or not he'll be able to help me.

I am also very interested in stuff like this, clue #348957348573 that I should have continued on with my schooling for physical therapy instead of stopping with the biology degree.

But.. c'est la vie.

crossing over to the dark side

I have done the unthinkable. After battling with a hamstring "niggle" for well over a year which has failed to go away even with several weeks of complete rest, I caved and made an appointment with a chiropractor. I do not believe in chiropractors or "alignments" or any of that nonsense. However, I have heard that this guy that I made an appointment with is a miracle worker. When I emailed Mary about my hamstring niggle I got a slap on the wrist for not telling her about it sooner and then a recommendation to Greater Rochester Chiropractic Group!

I am having a whole slew of issues with my right leg. Currently I have a deep soreness in my hamstring that flares up when I sit for a lengthy amount of time (such as driving), bend my leg, and run. Yeah - that's a problem. I also have had this weird tingling in my right foot that I've had since partway through my Ironman training. And now my right ankle is starting to bother me which could be a flare up of some lovely tendinitis. So I need to get this shit under control now. Hence me violating my belief system which includes real doctors and not chiropractors! But many, many teammates swear by this guy so I am going in with an open mind and hoping to god he can help me!

I am slowly trying to get back into it!

I cannot even begin to explain how bummed I was that Chrissie pulled out of Kona on Saturday. I was geared up and ready to watch her dominate the field. I absolutely LOVE Chrissie and honestly I don't really follow any other pros besides her. So when I found out that she wasn't racing, it basically killed my desire to watch Kona. I streamed it to my laptop and then hooked it up to my TV via some crazy wire that my dad got me last year and basically had it playing while I napped on and off on a very, very lazy Saturday. I started paying attention again during the last miles of the run because that's really the interesting part.

And because I can't go a week without some type of over-sharing about my life..

I am really fed up with how I handle things in my personal life. I am very sensitive and tend to take things way too personally. Therefore, my mood is directly affected by what other people say to me or how they treat me (or how I interpret them treating me). If someone is having a bad day and they snap at me, it will literally upset me for the rest of the day (this could be a friend, coworker, anyone). If someone ignores me because they are busy, I get offended. (Do you see a trend in how ridiculous this is?). And god forbid if I am actually fighting with someone, I can't focus on anything else. I have been known to cry after a crappy workout, or a stressful day at work, or a bad grade (like.. a B --> I'm a freak). Trouble letting go? ... never.  I know I am like this, it sucks, and I hate it. I need to CHILL OUT. So far my ideas on dealing with it better are to: smoke some weed, take Valium, go to therapy, ???????. Perhaps yoga.

*Just kidding about doing any drugs, mom and dad! :)

Shockingly, right now I am in a great mood which is a big relief after just being bummed out for no legitimate reason for a while. And I had a HORRIBLE night at work (like.. worst night of work ever) Sunday night and I think that was my breaking point, because the stressful night on top of being upset just wasn't working out very well. Today (or yesterday for all you normal people who sleep at night) I talked to a good friend, ate some Chipotle for dinner, cuddled with my cat, and watched some YouTube videos of cute kittens! And I made the executive decision to chill the f- out.. now I just have to execute.